The need to accurately position—and reposition as a new application may require—one or more items for proper operation of systems and apparatus has been known in several industries for years. Perhaps the most well known such positioner is a side guide positioner, which may find application in the bottling industry to maintain proper position of containers (bottles or cans, as but two examples) as they travel along a conveyor during processing (filling, capping, etc.). A similar type of positioner may operate as part of a palletizing system to maintain the proper position of pallets as they travel along a conveyor, whether for pallet manufacture or pallet loading. Positioners may also find application as part of a differential valve controller, an HVAC mixing control system (as a substitute for expensive blowers), a solar panels (e.g., to maintain optimal orientation relative to the sun) and a programmable vehicle suspension system (where ground clearance is controlled), as but three of many examples. Indeed, the inventive pressurized fluid positioner control system disclosed and claimed herein may be used to control the position of components of several different types of systems, whether such systems involve repeated monitoring and adjustment to assure proper positioning (e.g., during a single “run” on a single bottle size) or not.
There have been attempts in the past to provide position control systems that accurately adjust component(s), perhaps on a continual basis, to assure proper positioning by positioners and/or facilitate adjustments necessitated by the different size of an item processed for a specific “run.” However, such systems are often prohibitively costly, unnecessarily complex, and/or simply do not afford all the benefits afforded by the inventive technology.
FIG. 1A shows a prior art system. In it, compressed air from a compressor 21 is fed to a manual regulator 22 and thereafter a main tank 23 that then manifolds to, in this specific example, three digital proportional pressure regulators 3, each of which then manifold to solenoid valves 71, each of said solenoid valves fluidically connected (downflow) to accumulation tanks 72 and, further downflow, positioners of a positioner zone. Accumulation tanks, as explained below, increase volume of the zone's fluidic system and thereby prevent an impairing loss of pressure in the event of non-catastrophic leaks. A controller 10 provides control to coordinate valve operation with operation of the digital proportional pressure regulator. FIG. 1B shows a prior art system in which each of several digital proportional regulators 3 feed to manifolded positioners 11 of one of several positioner zones 9.